Some thoughts about marriage
I was just reading a post about marriage on another blog. I left the following as part of a comment on that post.
First [in regard to Ephesians 5], it seems significant to me that after saying so much about submission in the previous verses, nothing is said about submission when it comes to how a husband is supposed to relate to his wife. There are three possible reasons for this that come to my mind right away. First, it could be that a man isn't supposed to submit to his wife. Second, it could be that men are supposed to submit in a different way, requiring different Greek and English words to express the concept. Third, it could be that the need to submit is a necessary inference of the context.
I don't believe, at this point, that husbands are commanded to submit to their wives. You wrote earlier about "settling for love" instead of seeking oneness. I would say the passage in Ephesians is about not settling for submission. The call to love as Christ loves is all-encompassing in summing up our moral duty. To say that a husband should love his wife as Christ loves His church is to say that he should do all things possible to build up, strengthen, encourage, teach, care for, heal, satisfy, and delight her in every circumstance, and do so excellently and humbly, never seeking his own benefit nor elevating himself above the place Yahweh has given him. Perhaps that is essentially the same thing you mean when you talk about husbands submitting to their wives, but I want to explain why I think there is an important distinction.
In everything, the husband is given the responsibility of leading, from Adam being ordered to "guard the garden" to Eph. 5 and 1 Cor. 11, to today's Christian family. Not so that he can order his wife to serve himself, nor so that he can control her, but to keep the unity of the family. For example, a couple might argue whether or not to set back one spouse's career to move somewhere to advance the other spouse's career. If neither is submitting, there will be strife, and no unity. If both are submitting, there will be less strife perhaps, but what decision will be made? If the husband decides and the wife submits, they avoid not only the snares of arguing openly, but the subtle arguing of false humility, passive aggression, and other symptoms of false equality. (There is a true equality in Christ, an equilibrium of differences, but false equality demands equality in everything, including ways men and women were not meant to be equal. This false equality results from a distrust in God's equilibrium of differences to result in true equality, and it results in the strife of fighting against nature, the strife of trying to hammer square, human-made ideas of equality into a round, God-crafted pattern.)
Some would say that the husband having the authority to make the decision deprives a woman of her rights as an individual person. This ignores two realities of Christ. First, our individuality was not given to us to defend our rights, but so that we would have something unique to selflessly offer to Christ and to God's Kingdom. Second, if the husband is loving his wife the way Christ loves the church, even if he does not make the best possible decision, he will make a very good one. His Christ-like love for her is not prerequisite for her submission or her obedience - that is still necessary even if his love is nothing like Christ's. But Christ-like love makes his decisions far better, and that much easier for his wife to obey.
Finally, just as a perverted idea of an obedient wife has led many men to sin against their wives, so also a perverted idea of submitting to one's wife can lead to sin. One does not instinctively like the idea of one-way submission or an obedience that is not allowed exception, because that would allow a man to control his wife, and we know that is wrong. Such a situation seems ripe for abuse. But there is danger even in our human safeguards against such abuse. By teaching husbands to submit to their wives, one gives them yet another way to control their wives: by forcing them to lead. This doesn't sound so bad at first, but is a violation of God's plan with dire potential consequences. Perhaps foremost is that women don't need that extra burden: they're already given an extra responsibility by God, that is, childbearing. Also, women have a natural inclination towards their children, much more so than fathers (some fathers less than others). Fathers need the responsibility of leadership to force them to play a role in the rearing of children, and to direct them to the proper role (hint: it's not the role of pal). If you look at a family where false equality is sought, you will likely see confusion over who makes the rules, what the rules even are, and a lamentable inability to follow rules deeply ingrained into the children. Where the husband and father is a Christ-like leader, and where God's true equality is sought, the father is more involved in the making and enforcing of the rules, the mother is more respected, not less, and the children are better-behaved, and better able to follow rules and instruction as they grow older. There is hardly an end to the advantages of following God's plan for our lives, even if it doesn't seem right to us at first.
TPJ
First [in regard to Ephesians 5], it seems significant to me that after saying so much about submission in the previous verses, nothing is said about submission when it comes to how a husband is supposed to relate to his wife. There are three possible reasons for this that come to my mind right away. First, it could be that a man isn't supposed to submit to his wife. Second, it could be that men are supposed to submit in a different way, requiring different Greek and English words to express the concept. Third, it could be that the need to submit is a necessary inference of the context.
I don't believe, at this point, that husbands are commanded to submit to their wives. You wrote earlier about "settling for love" instead of seeking oneness. I would say the passage in Ephesians is about not settling for submission. The call to love as Christ loves is all-encompassing in summing up our moral duty. To say that a husband should love his wife as Christ loves His church is to say that he should do all things possible to build up, strengthen, encourage, teach, care for, heal, satisfy, and delight her in every circumstance, and do so excellently and humbly, never seeking his own benefit nor elevating himself above the place Yahweh has given him. Perhaps that is essentially the same thing you mean when you talk about husbands submitting to their wives, but I want to explain why I think there is an important distinction.
In everything, the husband is given the responsibility of leading, from Adam being ordered to "guard the garden" to Eph. 5 and 1 Cor. 11, to today's Christian family. Not so that he can order his wife to serve himself, nor so that he can control her, but to keep the unity of the family. For example, a couple might argue whether or not to set back one spouse's career to move somewhere to advance the other spouse's career. If neither is submitting, there will be strife, and no unity. If both are submitting, there will be less strife perhaps, but what decision will be made? If the husband decides and the wife submits, they avoid not only the snares of arguing openly, but the subtle arguing of false humility, passive aggression, and other symptoms of false equality. (There is a true equality in Christ, an equilibrium of differences, but false equality demands equality in everything, including ways men and women were not meant to be equal. This false equality results from a distrust in God's equilibrium of differences to result in true equality, and it results in the strife of fighting against nature, the strife of trying to hammer square, human-made ideas of equality into a round, God-crafted pattern.)
Some would say that the husband having the authority to make the decision deprives a woman of her rights as an individual person. This ignores two realities of Christ. First, our individuality was not given to us to defend our rights, but so that we would have something unique to selflessly offer to Christ and to God's Kingdom. Second, if the husband is loving his wife the way Christ loves the church, even if he does not make the best possible decision, he will make a very good one. His Christ-like love for her is not prerequisite for her submission or her obedience - that is still necessary even if his love is nothing like Christ's. But Christ-like love makes his decisions far better, and that much easier for his wife to obey.
Finally, just as a perverted idea of an obedient wife has led many men to sin against their wives, so also a perverted idea of submitting to one's wife can lead to sin. One does not instinctively like the idea of one-way submission or an obedience that is not allowed exception, because that would allow a man to control his wife, and we know that is wrong. Such a situation seems ripe for abuse. But there is danger even in our human safeguards against such abuse. By teaching husbands to submit to their wives, one gives them yet another way to control their wives: by forcing them to lead. This doesn't sound so bad at first, but is a violation of God's plan with dire potential consequences. Perhaps foremost is that women don't need that extra burden: they're already given an extra responsibility by God, that is, childbearing. Also, women have a natural inclination towards their children, much more so than fathers (some fathers less than others). Fathers need the responsibility of leadership to force them to play a role in the rearing of children, and to direct them to the proper role (hint: it's not the role of pal). If you look at a family where false equality is sought, you will likely see confusion over who makes the rules, what the rules even are, and a lamentable inability to follow rules deeply ingrained into the children. Where the husband and father is a Christ-like leader, and where God's true equality is sought, the father is more involved in the making and enforcing of the rules, the mother is more respected, not less, and the children are better-behaved, and better able to follow rules and instruction as they grow older. There is hardly an end to the advantages of following God's plan for our lives, even if it doesn't seem right to us at first.
TPJ
posted by weblogbob83 | 12:45 AM
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